Modern life requires that individual identification and document authenticity be quickly, conveniently and reliably verified. The necessity for both individual and document verification arises in almost every commercial transaction. Additionally, the necessity for individual identification arises in both social and governmental settings with ever increasing frequency.
Commercial transactions requiring both document verification and individual identification include credit card, calling card, automatic teller machine ("ATM") and similar transactions, as well as other daily commercial transactions such as check cashing. For example, when a check is presented to a bank for payment, the bank is required to verify the authenticity of the check writer's signature (called the endorsement) and that there is enough money in the checking account to cover the check. Authenticity of the endorsement is determined by comparing the signature appearing upon the check with a signature sample of the check writer on file with the bank. A reasonably good forgery of the endorsement might enable an unauthorized person to illegally cash the check.
Alternatively, in non-commercial settings, identification issues often arise in the context of security. For example, common apartment and office building security systems require that anyone wishing to enter the building "sign in" in front of a security guard, and often, to present the guard with a previously issued personal identification document which authorizes access to the building. The security guard is required to exercise his best personal judgment to determine that the identification document is authentic and that the person presenting it is the person identified on the identification document. In such circumstances, and understandably so, a security guard may be deceived by a person who is correctly identified on a forged or altered identification document. In the governmental context, it is a requirement in many countries that citizens carry personal identification papers in public to be produced for review upon request by appropriate authorities. For example, private individuals are required to present to the police personal identification, such as a driver's license, at the scene of a traffic accident or when stopped for a traffic violation. Additionally, personal identification documents are required for admittance to voting polls, and when crossing international boundaries and/or importing or exporting goods.
Accordingly, a pronounced need exists for unalterable self-verifying personal, commercial and governmental identification cards, papers, documents, labels, packaging and other similar articles. For the purposes of this patent document, an article shall be defined as any item having a surface, which may include a substrate, to which data may be fixed. As used herein, the term fixed shall mean one or more of the following, but is not limited to, attached, imprinted, adhered, etched, scratched, painted, printed, peened, embedded, machined, drilled, stamped, or otherwise imaged.
One current solution requires the use of biometric information that is stored in a memory device carried by an individual. The term biometric information refers to a characteristic personal to an individual, such as a signature, a finger print or a picture, for example. A sample of biometric information to be used is obtained from the person at an "encodation" site where the memory device is programmed under secure conditions. The sample is formed into a code by conventional encoding techniques. The sample may be obtained by having the person place a hand, eye, face or other unique physical feature upon a scanning input device. The scanned information is then encoded to form a code which is subsequently stored to an alterable, portable memory device (i.e., magnetic strips, electronic or optical memory cards, floppy disks, etc.). The portable memory device is issued to the person. When the person's identity needs to be verified, the person presents the portable memory device at a "remote access/decodation" site where identification verification is to occur, and the information contained within the portable memory device is read from memory. Another sample of biometric information is then obtained by the person again placing a particular physical feature upon the input scanning device. The read code and the just sampled biometric information are compared by a machine to determine authenticity. In this regard, the read code may be decoded, e.g., using a process that reverses the encodation performed previously, or the sample information encoded, e.g., using the same encoding process used at the encryption site, to make the comparison. Because this method requires a processing system for performing data encoding and/or decoding, complex opto-electric hardware at every encodation and remote access site, and a memory device for each person, this solution is exceedingly expensive.
It is therefore an object of the present invention to provide an unalterable code, for use on an article, which contains biometric identification information personal to the authorized bearer of the article.
Another object of the present invention is to provide methods and systems for inexpensively, accurately and efficiently producing unalterable self-verifying personal and commercial articles.
A further object of the present invention is to provide methods and systems for accurately, efficiently and inexpensively authenticating presented self-verifying articles.
A still further object of the present invention is to provide methods and systems for verifying the authenticity of self-verifying articles presented at remote access sites which do not require expensive verification equipment, such as physical-trait-scanning input devices, or the inconvenience of a communication channel to a central location.